Nationalism (a World History)

By (author) Storm Eric
Short description/annotation:
A global perspective on the nature and evolution of nationalism, from the early modern era to the present
Description:

A global perspective on the nature and evolution of nationalism, from the early modern era to the present

The current rise of nationalism across the globe is a reminder that we are not, after all, living in a borderless world of virtual connectivity. In Nationalism, historian Eric Storm sheds light on contemporary nationalist movements by exploring the global evolution of nationalism, beginning with the rise of the nation-state in the eighteenth century through the revival of nationalist ideas in the present day. Storm traces the emergence of the unitary nation-state—which brought citizenship rights to some while excluding a multitude of “others”—and the pervasive spread of nationalist ideas through politics and culture.

Storm shows how nationalism influences the arts and humanities, mapping its dissemination through newspapers, television, and social media. Sports and tourism, too, have helped fashion a world of discrete nations, each with its own character, heroes, and highlights. Nationalism saturates the physical environment, not only in the form of national museums and patriotic statues but also in efforts to preserve cultural heritage, create national parks, invent ethnic dishes and beverages, promote traditional building practices, and cultivate native plants. Nationalism has even been used for selling cars, furniture, and fashion.

By tracing these tendencies across countries, Storm shows that nationalism’s watershed moments were global. He argues that the rise of new nation-states was largely determined by shifts in the international context, that the relationships between nation-states and their citizens largely developed according to global patterns, and that worldwide intellectual trends influenced the nationalization of both culture and environment. Over the centuries, nationalism has transformed both geopolitics and the everyday life of ordinary people.

Review quote:
"Over 350-some brisk pages, Storm sets out to trace how nationalism developed in politics, culture and the arts from the age of the Enlightenment to the revolutions of 1848, then through 19th-century imperialism and industrialization, the two world wars, the decolonization wave of the late 20th century, and the rise of globalization. It’s grand-scale history along the lines of the “Age Of …” series (“The Age of Revolution” and so on) by Eric Hobsbawm. . . . Storm’s book tells the long and dramatic story of how nations conquered the world and became the dominant form of political organization of our era. It also makes clear that this era is far from over."---Joshua Keating, Washington Post
Review quote:
"[Storm is] a punctilious historian.... Alongside meticulously detailed accounts of wars, politics and treaties [he] paints an engaging picture of the role played by extrapolitical and cultural factors in the construction of nation-states and national identities."---Tunku Varadarajan, Wall Street Journal
Review quote:
"Comprehensive. . . . A detailed examination of the origin, use, and future of nationalist ideologies."
Biographical note:
Eric Storm is associate professor of general history at Leiden University. He has been a visiting scholar at the University Complutense of Madrid, Oxford University, and the Free University in Berlin. He is the author of The Culture of Regionalism and The Discovery of El Greco and the coeditor of Writing the History of Nationalism, Colonial Soldiers in Europe, Regionalism in Modern Europe, and World Fairs and the Global Moulding of National Identities.
Endorsement:
“A historical tour de force, this highly r